Laura is a civilian with the Edmonton Police Service and coordinates REStore. She has published two children’s books and a collection of poetry and is trying to learn Spanish.
Social Bonding Theory and the Role of Mentorship in Crime Prevention
Social Bonding Theory
Travis Hirschi’s Social Bond Theory can be described as “elements of social bonding include attachment to families, commitment to social norms and institutions (school, employment), involvement in activities, and the belief that these things are important (Bradley, 2018, p. 31). This theory was further developed by Sampson & Laub (2003), who conducted a study on a sample of youth to determine the link between social history and social structure to their offending behaviour (as cited in MacRae-Krisa, 2013, p. 18). They found that while individual traits were important predictors of the onset of offending, social ties and bonds to society were key determinants of crime prevention. Using social control as their basic principle, Sampson and Laub (2003) concluded that crime and deviance are more likely to occur when an individual’s bond to society is weak or broken (as cited in MacRae-Krisa, 2013, p. 18). People entrenched in the justice system have much weaker bonds to their greater society than their non- offending counterparts; without social bonds to discourage offending, these individuals are more likely to continue to engage in criminal behaviors (as cited in MacRae-Krisa, 2013, p. 18). When youth have strong bonds with other prosocial people in society and other social institutions, they are less likely to engage in behaviors that would compromise these bonds, such as committing crime. To foster social bonding to pro-social influences as a protective factor for youth to prevent the onset of offending or continuing offending behavior, youth mentorship is a vehicle to accomplish this.
Youth Mentorship
Butera (2014) describes mentorship as an asymmetrical, yet reciprocal relationship between a mentor and mentee; a mentor can benefit from the relationship, but the main goal is mentee growth and development. They continue by stating youth mentorship can also be thought of as a personal, unique relationship where a caring person gives consistent companionship, support, and guidance to develop the capacity and character of a youth. Abrams et al. (2014) add that other benefits of mentors are that they provide youth with “a personal connection, guidance, skills training, job networking and support, exposure to positive values, a sense of self-worth, goals, and hope for the future” (p. 406). Jarjoura (2016) stated that mentoring has the goal of youth development—helping youth thrive, not just survive. Thriving entails developing strong self-control, life skills, interpersonal skills, accountability, decision making and problem solving. They also recognize that underprivileged youth are at a disadvantage to thrive in their personal development—this is where mentoring can come in to help create more equitable opportunities. Underprivileged youth, such as at-risk youth and justice-involved youth, do not always have pro- social influences in their lives, such as positive family members or peers. DuBois (2002) also contends that many of these young people are structurally disadvantaged by a system that has failed to help them reach their full potential and find meaningful opportunities in their lives (as cited in Bradley, 2018, p. 27).
Social bonding is a protective factor because youth are very influenced by the people and institutions around them. Anderson et al. (2005) state that social bonding is a “stable, warm, affectionate relationship with one or both parents; link with teachers and with other adults and peers who hold positive attitudes, and ‘model’ positive social behaviour” (as cited in Bradley, 2018, p. 29 & 30). Therefore, mentors have the ability to establish social bonds with mentees and act as role models in order to help address their needs and build resiliency within them. Weinrath et al. (2016) claim that mentoring has become an increasingly popular intervention for young offenders. It can help youth increase their self-esteem and confidence through social support, which can also lower their negative coping strategies (Bradley, 2018, p. 30). Cuzick et al. (2011) used Social Bond Theory to explain the need for positive adult attachment: “attachments to adults and commitment with conventional social institutions reduce crime and delinquency by acting as agents of informal social control” (as cited in Costello & MacRae-Krisa, 2012, p. 6). Additionally, fostering positive familial or adult relationships while in custody are very important for a successful transition into the community after a youth has been incarcerated (Costello & MacRae-Krisa, 2012, p. 6). Reintegration is not a one-time event, but rather, a continuous process. According to Costello & MacRae-Krisa (2012), persistent youth offenders face a complex set of issues that usually cannot be resolved before they reach adulthood, so there must be a continuity of care during all stages of this transition phase (p. 4). For criminally involved youth, research has shown that transition planning should start at the first contact with the justice system to maximize rehabilitation; reintegration supports should continue as the youth moves through, and out of, the justice system (Ontario Ministry of Children and Youth Services [OMCYS], 2015, p. 8). Speaking to the effectiveness of reentry supports and aftercare programs that include a mentoring component, recent meta-analysis has found that they have been moderately successful in reducing recidivism for higher-risk youth (Abrams et al., 2014, p. 404).
Examples of Youth Mentorship Programs as Crime Prevention in Canada
There have been many initiatives and organizations dedicated to mentoring youth with the goal of preventing youth offending as well as supporting reintegration into their communities. In this section, I will explain two examples in Canada that have incorporated youth mentoring to promote protective factors and resilience in at-risk youth and gang- involved youth who are involved in the criminal justice system respectively.
Big Brothers Big Sisters of Canada
Big Brothers Big Sisters of Canada (BBBSC) is a Federation made up of 102 member agencies serving over 1100 communities across Canada (Big Brothers Big Sisters of Canada [BBBSC], 2019). As they recognize that youth struggle with many societal barriers and adversities in their lives that increase their risks to become involved in crime, developing mental health issues, or being trapped in cycles of poverty, they see mentorship as a way to prevent or diminish these risks to allow youth to reach their full potentials as individuals and citizens (BBBSC, 2019). Their mentoring programs make meaningful relationships by pairing adult volunteers (“Bigs”) with youth (“Littles”) (Big Brothers Big Sisters of America, 2019, p. 2). They seek to support vulnerable youth impacted by poverty and partner with other local organizations to deliver programs geared to specific populations, such as newcomers, Indigenous populations, and LGBTQ youth (Boys and Girls Clubs Big Brothers Big [BGCBigs], n.d.). In Edmonton, their impact has been known to decrease the chances of using alcohol and drugs, decrease truancy, decrease future use of social assistance as adults, and improve academic performance (BGCBigs, n.d.)
One of the new initiatives proposed by BBBSC is called the Mentoring for Change. Mentoring for Good program, funded by Public Safety Canada’s National Crime Prevention Strategy. According to the Public Safety Canada (2018) website, this program is a community- based program that helps youth resist or mitigate the risk factors of violence to enhance their skills that lead to healthy and positive lives. It incorporates best practices shown to be effective in working with high-risk target groups—youth aged 10-18 who are at risk of developing delinquent trajectories, with a focus on youth living in, or transitioning out of care, newcomer populations and/or visible minorities, and Indigenous youth. The main goals are to: decrease the youth’s engagement in violent activities; decrease social alienation, hopelessness, and depressive symptoms; and increase youth confidence and participation in pro-social activities. It is a five- year program that has been implemented between 2016 and 2021 taking place in three cities across Canada: Edmonton (Alberta), Grand Eerie (Ontario), and Saskatoon (Saskatchewan). An outcome evaluation study is currently being conducted (Public Safety Canada, 2018).
Spotlight Serious Offender Services Unit – Manitoba
Manitoba has developed a serious offender services program to reduce youth gang involvement, called “Spotlight”. It targets high-risk youth gang members with intensive supervision that incorporates mentorship after recognizing that many of their gang-involved young offenders also had high needs (Weinrath et al., 2016, p. 293 & 297). According to Weinrath et al. (2016), this program has a novel quality of using paid staff as mentors, called “street mentors”, as most mentorship programs reviewed by researchers usually focus on prevention efforts for at-risk youth with trained volunteers (p. 294). The street mentors are paid corrections employees, who have training in cognitive behavioral assessment and intervention techniques, are university educated, and are usually of an ethnocultural minority background (p. 298). It is their job to try to establish and maintain pro-social relationships with their clients while they work in teams of two with probation officers to manage caseloads (p. 298).
The Spotlight program has been met with positive results, as outlined by Weinrath et al.’s research; it has successfully reduced recidivism and reduced the severity of new convictions. The evaluation saw that 65.1% of Spotlight cases reoffended, whereas the comparison group had almost 90% new convictions (p. 306). It should be mentioned that the program takes some of the most serious gang-involved young offenders in Manitoba, so it was expected that the re- involvement rates would be high (p. 306). It can be argued that the re-involvement rates of Spotlight offenders are too high, but Weinrath et al. contend that involvement in Spotlight is still much better than youth being released from incarceration with no formal follow-up (p. 313). In terms of the severity of offences, about 17% of Spotlight cases were re-convicted of a highest severity crime; 36% of clients were convicted of high or medium severity crime; and almost two out of three were convicted of either administrative offences, low severity crimes, or no crimes (p. 306).
There were also positive results in the qualitative parts of the study. Weinrath et al. reported that participants had positive opinions about their street mentors and described them as “dependable, good listeners, empathetic, and good at problem solving” (p. 309). Participants engaged with various activities with their street mentors such as: physical activities, searching for employment, going to sweat lodges, being admitted into and staying in school, obtaining identification, receiving visits while incarcerated, attending court, and organizing volunteer work (p. 311). Some respondents also mentioned how the street mentors helped them avoid drugs and alcohol, gangs, and reoffending (p. 311). Weinrath et al. also emphasized how the positive comments came from both youth who succeeded in the program and those who had reoffended and were interviewed while in custody (p. 311). Although the youth didn’t meet the “success” measure of not reoffending, these comments suggest that these youth still gained some value from their street mentors and were still positively impacted by them. Weinrath et al. also discuss the benefit of having a mentor as opposed to a probation officer and how they make the biggest difference (p. 313). They said that mentors provide youth a sense of belonging that would substitute the familial function that gangs served for them, whereas probation officers, despite their frequent contact with the youth, are not able to provide this familiar feeling (p. 313). Mentorship contributes to the process of changing the course of these individual’s lives away from crime and gang involvement by the positive influence that a dependable, pro-social figure provides. There are many challenges and barriers that you face during the transition to adulthood; however, this is especially true for at-risk and justice-involved youth. There are many factors that they face that put them at risk of offending or hinder their successful reintegration back into community from incarceration. In order to prevent crime and aid the reintegration of young offenders back into Canadian society, it is imperative that mentoring opportunities are available for their social and personal development in order to realize their true potentials as members of society.
Citations
Abrams, L. S., Mizel, M. L., Nguyen, V., & Shlonsky, A. (2014). Juvenile Reentry and Aftercare Interventions: Is Mentoring a Promising Direction? Journal of Evidence-Based Social Work, 11(4), 404–422. https://doi.org/10.1080/10911359.2014.897115
Big Brothers Big Sisters of Canada. 2019. About us. Big Brothers Big Sisters of Canada. Retrieved from https://bigbrothersbigsisters.ca/about-us/
Bradley, J. (2018). Youth mentoring as a viable crime prevention strategy: evidence and Ontario policy, with reflections from some mentors. Retrieved from https://ruor.uottawa.ca/bitstream/10393/37250/3/Bradley_Jeffrey_2018_thesis.pdf
Butera, J.-A. (2014). Effective youth mentoring : best practices. Crime Prevention Ottawa. Retrieved from http://login.ezproxy.library.ualberta.ca/login?url=https://search.ebscohost.com/login .aspx?direct=true&db=cat03710a&AN=alb.8378975&site=eds-live&scope=site
Costello, M. Y., & MacRae-Krisa, L. D. (2012). An environmental scan of best practices in supporting persistent youth offenders in the transition to adulthood. Canadian Research Institute for Law and the Family. Retrieved from http://login.ezproxy.library.ualberta.ca/login?url=https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?d irect=true&db=cat03710a&AN=alb.8374097&site=eds-live&scope=site
Jarjoura, R. (2016). Mentoring youth in conflict with the law. American Institute for Research. Retrieved from https://albertamentors.ca/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/Mentoring-Youth- in-Conflict-with-the-Law.pdf
Public Safety Canada. Mentoring for change. mentoring for good. (2018). Public Safety Canada. Retrieved from https://www.publicsafety.gc.ca/cnt/cntrng-crm/crm-prvntn/nvntr/dtls- en.aspx?i=10177
Weinrath, M., Donatelli, G., & Murchison, M. J. (2016). Mentorship: a missing piece to manage juvenile intensive supervision programs and youth gangs? (Canada). Canadian Journal of Criminology and Criminal Justice, (3), 291. Retrieved from https://search-ebscohost- com.login.ezproxy.library.ualberta.ca/login.aspx?direct=true&db=edscpi&AN=edscpi.A4 94369576&site=eds-live&scope=site
Leading an Unwanted Life: Fostering Healing Through Understanding